The Spectacle Blog

Today, the White House kicks off a three day journey, deep into the bowels of social media, to root out and discuss the origins and spread of extremism in places like Facebook and Twitter. The Social Media Summit will feature officials and experts from 60 countries, and will focus on how social media creates the perfect environment to foster rhetoric that leads to violence and how economically marginalized people are targeted through social media to join up with extremist groups.

Unfortunately, while there is plenty of evidence that terrorists, generally, and ISIS, specifically recruit and network on social media (a friend of mine even had an ISIS fighter comment on a very lovely photo of her dog just recently), the White House will turn the summits attention to more pressing issues in the social media sphere, like how to use celebrities to reach out to communities suffering from terribly high unemployment, and how to make "hastag activism" more effective.

Yesterday, a group of Wisconsin "college students" (and paid union activists) who should have been studying, celebrated Presidents Day by marching on Scott Walker's Wisconsin home, while shouting a bunch of slogans they must have picked up from their Vietnam Era professors and holding signs demanding that their four-year universities receive more public funding because they simply cannot afford to finance their Native People Gender Studies degrees all on their own.

The rousing group of 100 marched around for hours in the cold, presumably to convince Gov. Walker, by shouting at him, that they deserved more money to fund teachers, so that they could pay dues to their union, so that the union could continue to spend money marching around for hours in the cold shouting for more money.

Rallying against Gov. Scott Walker’s proposed state budget, more than 100 protesters gathered outside of his Wauwatosa home from about 5:10 to 5:25 p.m. Monday.

The order will halt execution of any of the program's initiatives, some of which were scheduled to start this week. It could yet be stayed by the Fifth Circuit (even by tonight, if things move really quickly), but for now, the Administration will need to come up with a Plan B.

Wendell Kim, who served as a third base coach for the San Francisco Giants, Boston Red Sox and Chicago Cubs, died on Sunday of Alzheimer's. He was 64.

Usually you don't notice third base coaches. But Kim was hard to miss. He was the first Korean to ever put on a big league uniform, usually the shortest guy on the field and the most demonstrative. Kim sent baserunners home with reckless abandon. It was not unusual for the runners he sent to get thrown out at home plate and I saw more than my share at Fenway Park the first year I began attending games in 2000. This earned him the simultaneously affectionate and derisive nickname "Wave 'Em Home Wendell".

But Kim paid his dues. He spent nearly two decades in the Giants' minor league system as a player, coach and manager before getting the call in 1989. That year, the Giants would win the NL pennant. He would never get back to the Fall Classic, but he spent 15 seasons on big league fields. I'm sure there are a lot of folks out there who would gladly trade places with him.

Born Lesley Goldstein in Brooklyn, Gore would hit the top of the charts at the age of 16 with "It's My Party".

Although she would never record another number one song, she did have a string of Top 20 hits during the 1960s including "Judy's Turn to Cry", "You Don't Own Me" and the Marvin Hamlisch penned "Sunshine, Lollipops & Rainbows". Gore also occasionally acted appearing in two episodes of Batman.

In 1980, Gore and her younger brother Michael were nominated for an Academy Award for co-writing the song "Out Here on My Own" for the film Fame. During the '80s and '90s, Gore was a fixture on the oldies circuit. In the last decade of her life, much of Gore's public activity revolved around LGBT issues after revealing she was a lesbian in 2005.

In retaliation for the beheading of 21 Egyptian Christians by ISIS in Libya, Egypt has launched airstrikes against ISIS targets in Libya.

What I think is extraordinary about this retaliation is that Egypt is doing this on behalf of a religious minority that has not traditionally enjoyed much esteem in Egyptian society. I cannot imagine Hosni Mubarak being moved to this kind of action had he still be in power. But General Sisi has cultivated good relations with the Copts and now he is standing with them in their hour of need.

While it's heartening to see both Jordan and Egypt standing firm, the United States needs to be all in and the Obama Administration's AUMF is barely going through the motions.

When President Obama commented Friday on the Chapel Hill shootings in which three Muslims were murdered in cold blood he made a point of stating, "No one in the United States of America should be targeted because of who they are, what they look like or how they worship."

If only the President could imagine the same level of passion when people are murdered because they are Jewish or Christian.

As we are painfully aware, Obama could not bring himself to characterize the murder of four Jews who were murdered at the Hyper Cacher grocery store in Paris as anti-Semitic.

Well, nor does it seem, is the Obama White House capable of acknowledging the beheading of Egyptian Christians in Libya. The Obama Administration only acknowledges them as "Egyptian citizens". At least, the White House didn't call the act random - yet.

It’s rare that one has a chance to strike a blow for civilization while on a late afternoon exercise walk. But I have just enjoyed such an opportunity.

At about minute 20 into my walk, and while I was listening to a book on CDs on my old Sony Walkman, a 40ish fellow wearing shorts, a T-shirt, and a baseball cap with the bill pointed backwards, carrying some circulars, said to me as I approached, “If you live around here I’d like to talk to you about being your city councilman.”

I don’t know this guy from Adam’s housecat, and my area of South Tampa is represented by a popular Democrat who is going to win the council seat easily. So it really doesn’t matter who this solicitor is. But what a strange costume for a guy fishing for votes other than at a high school or at a shopping mall game room. So as I passed him I said, “Now’s not a good time, as you can see. But here’s some free political advice. There are mostly adults behind the doors you’re knocking on here, so turn your damn baseball cap around frontwards.”

I'm about to embark on a West Coast jaunt, so naturally, Congress is about to make travel slightly more difficult and confusing by hanging the Department of Homeland Security's fate in the balance twoards the end of the month. Now, granted, the TSA will still get more than the required funding necessary to paw through my unmentionables in front of a handful of weary travelers at an ungodly morning hour, but I'm sure that, by the end of next week, literally everyone will be losing their respective minds over the prospect of DHS losting its funding, rendering the general public even less capable of handling basic instructions like put your shoes directly on the conveyor belt.

Last night, Saturday Night Live celebrated 40 years on the air, presumably because, given the ten more years required to reach a real milestone, everyone's pickled livers would have given out, rendering the show forced to celebrate it's awkward 1980s downturn instead of it's 1970s heyday. In attendance were some of the show's brightest stars, celebrities who've made multiple hosting appearances, iconic musical acts and Sarah Palin.

It's understandable, of course, that the show would welcome it's most famous target, especially since Tina Fey's Sarah Palin impression is almost inseperable from most people's idea of who Sarah Palin actually is. Sarah, for her part, wore her daughter's dress and poked fun at herself in a way very few politicians are able to do. But while her appearance generally suprised and delighted audiences, at least one sitting Congressional representative was incensed that she snagged an invite while his got lost in the mail.

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